We are back to toasty Tucson. It was 111 and now we’ve cooled down to a chilly 108! It’s been great for staying in and working on genealogy tough.

The weekend is here once again, too, and Randy Seaver has an interesting challenge for us this week:

1)  Learning about how to pursue genealogy and family history is a lifetime task.  Once you’ve mastered one record type (census, church, certificates, probate, directories, immigration, etc), or one skill (family tree software program, record transcription, source citations, DNA matches, AI prompting, etc.), a new record, or skill, presents itself.  With the constant advances in technology and knowledge, doing genealogy and family history well requires constant learning to do something new. 

2)  This week’s challenge is to tell us a new genealogy-related skill that you have, or are working on, developing.  Tell us about your progress.  Are you having fun?

We’ll see if I make any discoveries, but I decided to join the Society of Genealogists in London, England. They have many programs online and, since I have identified more than 100 ancestral town in England, I decided to learn more about their records, aside from the usual birth, marriage and death collections.

Yesterday, I attended an open chat for members to share topics or ask questions. My questions will always be about very old records because aside from my Loyalist James Astle, probably born c1745 in England, my latest-born-in-England ancestor is Samuel Scripture, born there in 1650.

There have been hints about Samuel’s possible origins in Tetbury, Gloucestershire. He was first apprenticed to James Swinerton in 1662, aged 12, for four years in Nevis in the Caribbean. When he finished that term, he apprenticed to Samuel Davis and was living in Groton, Massachusetts by the 1670s. Both Mr. Swinerton and Mr. Davis were from Tetbury. However, those church registers are lost.

However, the attendees had several great suggestions for me. First, is the Bristol Register of Apprenticeships that cover the 1600s. Samuel is in there and for £7, I can purchase a download of the entire volume, covering from the 1500s to the 1700s!

Secondly, I learned that Nevis business at that time was mainly sugar. The Tubbey family owned a large plantation there and, apparently, there are family papers to be accessed.

Next, the Guild of One-Name Studies includes Swinnerton and I have contact information for the person currently in charge of that study.

Lastly, apparently, Nevis itself has archives of its history so there might be more to learn about Samuel there.

I’m learning about all kinds of new resources and, yes, it is definitely fun!

Anyone with deep English roots should take a look at all that the Society of Genealogists has to offer long distance. I’m starting with the one-month gold membership, which was about $20 U.S. and, so far, worth every penny.

Thanks, Randy, for another fun topic.